Produced by Jamie Marinos, Any Colour You Desire is set to be a seminal release for the band. “This feels like we’re now going in the direction we want to be,” guitarist Liam Fowler tells us. “We spent a long time not knowing exactly where we wanted to take this or knowing what kind of band we wanted to be.”
One listen to Any Colour You Desire and you can easily see what Fowler is talking about. There’s a sense of progression and confidence that Pridelands exerts on this EP. As Fowler explains further, finding who they wanted to be really came from the idea of finding each other.
“We took a far more collaborative approach to the writing. Formally, I would put together a whole song and everyone would add their little bits.” What was once a process helmed by Fowler is now a process that had just about every member involved from the ground up. “Josh [Cory, vocals] and I started writing it early last year and we spent so much time in the bedroom just bouncing off of each other. Our new drummer Joe [Lipsham] had a really big part in the writing this time too. It all just comes from one of us having an idea [and] bouncing off of each other until we find something that’s perfect.” From Fowler’s perspective, there wasn’t a single downside to writing this way. “It felt like we were actually a band.”
This unity in the writing applies also to the EP’s dark themes. “It’s a very emotive record to us,” Fowler candidly says. “Everything we’ve done in the past, though we like it, just doesn’t feel like us anymore. This record feels like an amalgamation of where we all are at in our life. It’s very dark and it feels a lot more mature, a lot fresher to us and we’re really happy with it.”
One thing that isn’t dark is the cover art designed and co-conceptualised by Pat Fox. Whilst it looks like something out of a scene of Guardians of the Galaxy, there’s actually a lot of meaningful symbolism to the design that Fowler generously shared with us.
“If you look closely at the cover, you’ll see that each acolyte is receiving a different colour. Those colours all represent a different emotion. What I’d done previously is work out the core emotion of each of the songs and then worked out the opposing emotion. I then found the shade on a psychology chart of these more positive emotions and matched them up”.
Rather than focus on the negative emotions portrayed in the music, Fowler wanted to make sure that the acolytes were portrayed as receiving the colours they desired, ringing true to the EP’s title. If this new batch of songs has got you salivating at the mouth for more Pridelands, then you’re in luck because Any Colour You Desire is only the beginning.
“This is only the first taste. We’re stepping further and further away from what people might expect from us.” Fowler says, excitement in his voice. Whilst he can assure us Pridelands won’t be going full pop anytime soon, he does reiterate not to place bets on their future sound just yet. “We’re gonna start releasing stuff that I don’t think people are expecting.”
Any Colour You Desire is out now. Pick it up so you can say you liked Pridelands before they’re playing mainstage at everyone’s favourite festivals.
